User menu

PM's wife to women: Seek financial independence

The wife of Prime Min­is­ter on Tues­day ad­vised all women to at­tain fi­nan­cial in­de­pen­dence.

She was speak­ing at the Women of In­flu­ence sym­po­sium host­ed by the Bankers’ As­so­ci­a­tion of T&T (BATT) and AFETT held at the Hy­att Re­gency ho­tel yes­ter­day.

“I make my own mon­ey. I have my own bank ac­count and I cer­tain­ly don’t have to ask the Prime Min­is­ter for mon­ey,” she said.

She de­scribed her­self as an in­de­pen­dent woman who still works and who, pri­or to 2015, had man­aged the fam­i­ly’s house­hold.

The PM’s wife said sev­er­al peo­ple had asked her if she con­tin­ued to work af­ter her hus­band be­came the prime min­is­ter.

“And I an­swered..it is a re­sound­ing ‘yes’. No mis­take about it.

I con­sid­er my­self an em­pow­ered and in­de­pen­dent woman,” she said.

The PM’s wife added that while many women have a voice, there are many women in oth­er coun­tries who are voice­less.

“They are not heard. Some­times they aren’t even seen.”

“And de­spite the strides we have made in T&T to­wards gen­der equal­i­ty there are still too many women who have no idea what equal­i­ty is about.

These women don’t know about equal pay for equal work.

These women have to deal with sex­u­al ha­rass­ment, rape, do­mes­tic vi­o­lence. We can­not ig­nore the un­ac­cept­able and sense­less acts of vi­o­lence com­mit­ted by some of our men and boys against our women and girls,” she said.

This, the PM’s wife urged, must not be tol­er­at­ed, adding that cit­i­zens can­not re­main in­dif­fer­ent to these is­sues.

She said women must be al­lowed to live their lives free from dis­crim­i­na­tion and live free from phys­i­cal and men­tal abuse.